Posted by Sabrina B. @gametimegirl
Plaxico Burress saw the ball coming his way and everything started to move in slow motion.
He stretched his arms out, grabbed the pass over his shoulder and fell into the end zone for a touchdown. After being away from the game for nearly three years, Plax was back.
“Everything feels normal,” the wide receiver said. “It feels like football. To be honest, it feels like I never left.”
Burress caught three passes for 66 yards, including a terrific 26-yard reception for a touchdown, in his first game since 2008 to help the New York Jets beat the Cincinnati Bengals27-7 in a preseason game Sunday night.
“It’s the tip of the iceberg,” Burress said. “I’m just getting started.”
Signed last month after serving 20 months in prison on a gun charge, Burress made his debut with the Jets (1-1) a memorable one. He caught a 20-yard pass from Mark Sanchez on the Jets’ first offensive play, prompting huge cheers from the rain-soaked crowd at the New Meadowlands Stadium.
“He was ready to play,” Sanchez said. “He’s been waiting for this for a long time, so I didn’t have to say anything or do anything, really, except get him a ball that he could catch and he was rolling after the first play.”
Burress had another 20-yard grab in the second quarter, but the highlight came on New York’s last offensive play of the first half.
Burress took off down the left sideline, drew separation from defensive back Fred Bennett and hauled in the pass as he dropped into the end zone to put New York up 17-7. Burress got up and bowed a few times to the crowd, which had seen him make similar plays for years with the Steelers and Giants.
“It’s a good thing to make it seem like everything is going in slow motion because that means the game is still slow to me,” he said. “Nothing’s moving fast. To have that ball hanging up in the air like that with the lights and different things like that, I just trusted myself to make an over-the-shoulder catch and try to bring it in.”
Burress recently turned 34 and has acknowledged that many doubt he can return to the elite level he was playing at before he accidentally shot himself in the leg at a Manhattan nightclub in 2008. But the former Super Bowl star with the Giants has insisted throughout training camp — even while he was hobbled by a sprained left ankle — that he expects to be a game-changing receiver again.
After missing the preseason opener at Houston because of the ankle injury, Burress backed up his bold words against the Bengals (0-2).
“He played great,” Jets coach Rex Ryan said. “If we get the coverage a certain way, good luck to you. He is a big target and when he is covered, he is open.”
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